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I do a bi-modal commute car from Winchester to Reston then bike to downtown DC.

Mine was the one at 2:15 this morning wearing jeans and a dark tshirt, no lights, no reflectors no helmet riding his MTB down the right lane on Rt 7 in Sterling when I was inbound. Almost turned him into a hood ornament.

Wow, what a combination: No helmet, headphones, AND passing on the right - seriously, it makes all my prep seem paranoid and insane (not necessarily in that order). My helmet is the first thing I look for, I wish I could listen to music but I don't think it's safe. Passing, if I'm so lucky, is always on the left. I review every ride afterwards and think about the decisions I made and what could be improved.

As for the hood ornament, well geez, something that big would probably be hell on your gas mileage.

Since the weather got warmer, I've seen some crazy stuff on the trails/streets, and I'm wondering whether any of you try to do any "education" in a constructive manner with other cyclists. On the one hand, I want to encourage anyone who decides to get on a bike. On the other hand, I often observe someone just having a narrow miss (or about to have one) and is completely oblivious. I'm sometimes tempted to say something (assuming the chance doesn't pass too quickly), and I would try to do it in my stern-but-friendly-mother persona rather than crazy-dragon-lady guise. So far I've been unable to think of a way to offer anything that would be constructive and well-received. Maybe there isn't any way to do it. Anyone else have any experience with this?

I was going to "educate" this guy but he turned off a different way before I could catch him and it wasn't worth chasing him.

I've "educated" people before though - like the guy who once passed me on the right as I was also being passed on the left and veering to the right to make room. I usually emphasize that what the offender did was unsafe for the him/her as well as me.

I still remember seeing some hotdog on a mountain bike years ago on the Mt. V on one of these sunny spring days. There was a crowd, so she decided she wanted to pass on the right, in the grass--she did have a mountain bike after all, and those people can't wait to get into the dirt. She ran right into a rock hidden in the grass and popped her tire wide open.

I spend all day thinking about bikes and talking to people on the internet about them.

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I saw a young guy (early 20s?) on the MVT last summer sitting up, no hands on the handlebars, holding a cellphone to his ear, and riding on the wrong side of the trail. I noticed this because he was heading straight for me (since I was riding on the correct side of the trail). Fortunately I was able to shout at him to wake up and get his attention. He put his hands back on the handlebar and moved over to his right.

For some reason, my first thought was that he was a summer congressional intern who had only been in town for a couple weeks.

I've never thought the bicycling community is particularly well served by introducing politics, and especially partisan politics, into its advocacy. My views are certainly closer to the Republicans than the Democrats. The biggest bicycle advocate in the upcoming presidential race is likely Gary Johnson.